US de­ci­sion puts the world in ‘ring of fire’

– Turk­ish Pres­i­dent Re­cep Tayyip Er­do­gan yes­ter­day lashed out at US coun­ter­part Don­ald Trump’s de­ci­sion to recog­nise Jerusalem as the cap­i­tal of Is­rael, say­ing it would put the re­gion in a “ring of fire”.

“Tak­ing this type of step puts the world, es­pe­cially the re­gion, in a ring of fire,” Er­do­gan said in a speech to supporters at Ankara air­port be­fore head­ing on a visit to Greece.

“Hey Trump! What do you want to do?” he said, ad­dress­ing the US leader di­rectly in one of Er­do­gan’s fa­mil­iar rhetor­i­cal habits.

“What kind of ap­proach is this? Po­lit­i­cal lead­ers do not stir things up, they seek to make peace!” he added.

There were chants of “damn Is­rael!” and boos from Er­do­gan supporters when the pres­i­dent first men­tioned the US move.

In a speech on Wed­nes­day, Trump over­turned decades of US pol­icy with a de­ci­sion to recog­nise the dis­puted city.

He also kicked off the process of mov­ing the US em­bassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem. – AFP